Hidden Behind My White Mask
by My Echoing Silence
Summary: Slash & het shipping. Set 14 years after Naruto was exiled for not bringing Sasuke back. He is nothing like he used to be. And he has joined a Village neutral in the Leaf Sound War. Better than it sounds. Proper summery in Profile.
1. Chapter 1

**_Disclaimer_: Everything belongs to their original creator. I own only my stuff. **

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A slim figure sauntered with the lazy grace of a predator along the spine of the mansion roof, his blond mane and hooded black trench coat lined in white fluttering in the stiff night air. Though his face concealed with a blank white porcelain mask, nevertheless, the mystery added to his character. When the figure reached an intersection, he turned right before proceeding another twenty meters to the end where he crouched.

Directly below the place where the blond shadow crouched was a window; an open window glowing with warm yellow light. Pouty pink lips curved beneath the mask into an ironic smile as Silence attached the pulley and thin metal cable contraption to the roof and the smaller contraption the strong leather abseiling harness around his torso. Quickly bringing out and loading his blowpipe, Silence swung down and bounced down to the window.

The smile turned into a smirk when the roving Love-Me-Not blue eyes landed on the obese Daimyo groping a beautiful, young, scantily clad and, from the look of things, drugged youth of barely fourteen. Silence was so looking forward to killing this paedophile. The pipe was lifted to the slightly parted ceramic lips and the poisoned dart was airborne with a sharp puff.

The man swatted at his neck as if to hit a bug, but when his hand came away with the small grey dart, the man started to blubber. Silence's smirk widened as he stepped in the window and unhooked himself. The man was one the floor by now as the poison inflamed the windpipe, causing swelling that was choking the fat man. The drugged boy just watched with distant incomprehension.

Silence practically skipped over to the still gagging Daimyo, unhooked the hatchet from the back of his belt, grabbed the greasy black hair to expose the throat and brought said hatchet down on the neck and grasping hands.

A few quick whacks and Silence straightened with the head in his right hand. He paused to flick a stray finger out of the collar of his coat, the white mask streaming with nearly black blood.

Dumping the head onto the boy's lap, Silence moved into the strongroom on the left side of the room behind the fake wall, the ring of keys hanging from his left hand, hatchet back in place on the belt to be cleaned later.

Several minutes later, Silence exited the now strongroom, slipping the three Storage Scrolls containing everything in the strongroom into a pouch. Silence glanced at the boy he recognized as Hino Shingo, only son and heir of the Fire Country's Daimyo, missing for two months now to the distraught Lord's grief. Moving to the wardrobe, Silence removed a shirt which he pulled over the boy's head, carefully but hastily pulling the delicate arms through the oversized sleeves.

Silence glanced at the headless mound. A hand dipped into a small pouch and something small was tossed onto the corpse's chest.

The boy was hauled to his feet where he swayed as Silence put the head in a black waterproof bag that wouldn't let blood dribble everywhere. Silence led the boy to the window and hooked himself to the cable. Turning to the youth, the nin hesitated a moment as he contemplated exactly _how _he was supposed to carry the boy up and, once out of the compound, _what_ he was going to do with him.

Heaving a sigh, Silence wrapped the boy's arms around his neck and lifted the boy up by his small bare thighs and wrapped them around his waist just above the cable.

"Hold on tightly, now. I'm getting you out of here and back home. Your father's been worried about you." The only response Silence's soft, husky voice got was a tightening of arms and legs around his body.

Holding the boy with one arm, Silence swung out the window and hit the remote button which would pull them up.

**(space)**

The young man, who had quietly left the Lightning Daimyo's compound in the early hours of the morning two days ago with the Fire Daimyo's son and all of the deceased Daimyo's most treasured belongings, was seated against the wall of a sandy cave just inside Fire Country along the Wind-Fire border, carefully portioning out the amounts of the drug Hino Shingo was dosed with.

Uzumaki Naruto, 26-year-old S-Class Missing-nin from Konohagakure, under the alias Silence, was actually pretty impressed with this particular drug; it had taken him two hours to identify the effects of the drug, four more to figure out what was in it and twenty minutes further to duplicate it. The drug, which he had found to cloud the mind, stimulate nerves and provide a mild painkiller to stop pain from over-stimulation, also acted as a poison. If the drug was not reapplied every day at the same time, it would cause a slow agonised death over the course of three to four hours as the over-stimulated blood vessels started rupturing and nerves sent jolts of agony through the body at the slightest touch of even silken clothing.

So Naruto was making enough in gradually smaller dosages to wean Shingo off the stuff when he got the kid home.

Naruto finished the last dosage and put the vial in its place in the small, levelled medicine chest just as the boy on the pallet moaned.

The pale face, marked with three black whiskers on each high sculptured cheek, further accenting the large cat-shaped eyes the same shade of Love-Me-Nots viewed through a tank of water, turned to regard the stirring youth. The mouth that was once known for the wide near-insane grins was used now only for small, close-mouthed smiles that were barely a tilting of lips and the voice that came forth from them was no longer the loud, brash prepubescent yelling, but rather a soft, husky, whispery baritone that rumbled in the chest like far-off thunder.

Naruto closed the box and stood as his free hand snagged the water-pouch as he moved across the cave. Lifting the boy up by his shoulders to rest against his chest, Naruto lifted the pouch to the chapped lips. Reddish-brown eyes fluttered open.

"Who-?"

"Drink and go back to sleep. I'll take you back to your father's mansion tomorrow."

"Who-?"

Naruto sighed. The kid was not going to go back to sleep without the question answered. "I'm Uzumaki, Kid. Uzumaki Naruto. Some call me 'Silence' or 'The Silencer'."

The boy whimpered slightly in fear, his eyes flashing their whites.

Lips twisted bitterly. "The reputation I've garnered is massively blown out of proportion. There are ANBU out there who have done a hell of a lot more than I have; it's just that ANBU work anonymously so they usually aren't that well known." Naruto lay the boy back down. "I, however, have limits. I don't kill kids, I don't kill people who don't deserve it and I don't break my promises."

The blonde moved over to the fire where a pot was bubbling merrily, well aware that the boy's dark eyes were watching him warily. "Besides, your mother was kind to me as a child. There were very few who were and I have a long memory for such things."

When it became apparent Naruto was done speaking for the night, Shingo sighed and went back to a troubled sleep.

**(space)**

Silence settled back into the tree as the medic-nin of the Konoha hospital rushed the boy clutching the medic-box in into the building.

"Not going to announce my presence, Hatake-san?"

Naruto felt the momentary surprise from his former sensei before the Jounin recovered. "Should I?"

Silence straightened and popped his back and shoulder muscles. The black clad shoulders shrugged. "Your call. I'm not here to do any harm. If you call me out, there is a very high chance Leaf-nin will die. If you let be go, no one but you, me and the kid will know I was ever here."

"Hn."

The presence disappeared. Naruto smiled behind his mask and flickered away

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	2. Chapter 2

**_Disclaimer:_** I do not own anything recognised as belonging to other people.

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Naruto glared at the two men from behind his mask, lower lip threatening to slip forward petulantly. 

"I hope you realise how put out I am with you both right now."

Itachi allowed a smirk to slip onto his usually stoic face. "Now, now, Naruto-kun. No need to be childish about it."

Kisame grinned cheerfully, sharp teeth flashing. "Yeah, kid. It's not like you never saw this coming."

Naruto sighed, rather irate that he'd been caught in a simple rope trap, not to mention he was getting a headache from all the blood rushing to his head.

"Kind of. But really…a trap as simple as this? I was expecting some kind of knock-down, drag-out epic battle to the death." He pulled a face. "But this is just plain embarrassing."

Itachi chuckled in an amused and slightly sympathetic fashion. "Indeed." The Uchiha Monster pulled back his fist and sent it sailing into the Jinchuuriki's stomach.

The blonde went limp.

**(space)**

Naruto woke to the distinct feeling of hitting the ground.

'..._Itai_…'

"FIRE JUTSU: GIANT FIREBALL TECHNIQUE!"

The blond blinked blearily, thankful that his mask was still in place but mentally cursing the Akatsuki nin for tying his wrists along one another, making it impossible to make hand seals.

"Really, Otouto. Is that all you've got? After all that time I gave you to train?"

"Shut up and _DIE_ already!"

'_Sasuke. Typical.'_ Naruto mentally grumbled. As if it wasn't enough having all his worldly belongings not on him burnt by villagers and getting run out of the Village by the civilians and some shinobi, the bastards on the council had let the little snob back into Konoha with open arms when he turned up. Only consolation as far as Naruto was concerned was that Tsunade-baa-chan had stripped him of his rank as a nin and nothing either Sasuke or the council said could change her mind.

Naruto sent her flowers and a card.

There was a ring of steel to the right and Kisame gave a bloodthirsty chuckle before Naruto found himself grabbed and carried out of the battlefield.

Then, once again, the poor little Jinchuuriki found himself dumped on the ground. Kind of peeved at his treatment, Naruto nevertheless remained limp and unresponsive.

"Hide him. We can question him later. Right now, we have to help Sasuke-sama and Shikamaru-sensei."

Naruto found himself stuffed into a conveniently placed crevice while the three kids, presumably genin, ran back to the fight, leaving Silence in their wake…unguarded.

As soon as the genin were gone, Naruto promptly called on a little of the Kyuubi's power to give him claws which he used to saw through the bonds. This took him several minutes.

Now Naruto was faced with a dilemma.

Sasuke might be able to hold his own for long enough that Itachi lost interest and Shikamaru was intelligent enough to be able to avoid Kisame's great hulking fish knife, but the three genin were, from what he could tell, fresh from the academy and on their first C-Rank mission ever.

With a sigh of self-disappointment, Naruto headed back towards the fight.

**_(space)_**

"Stupid fucking Uchihas!" The blond missing-nin hissed evilly as he cleaned the cut running from his right shoulder to elbow, a little woozy from a mild infection he was sure had settled in his back wound.

As if it wasn't bad enough that his hero complex had kicked in and sent him gallivanting off to save the Konoha shinobi from the big bad missing-nins, after Naruto had arrived and stopped Itachi from landing the killing blow on his younger brother and succeeded in sending Itachi and Kisame into full retreat, he had turned to ask the Uchiha Avenger if he was alright when the little prick had attacked him!

Naturally, it had taken a moment for it to sink in enough to started attacking back instead of dodging, and Naruto had gained a few cuts from a pair of kunai before Shikamaru had caught the enraged Uchiha in his Shadow Hold. The Nara Genius had apologised for his companion's behaviour before inquiring as to why Naruto had helped them. The blonde had promptly answered that he didn't like owing debts and that it was a one-time thing. Shikamaru had nodded in acceptance before asking why they had captured him to begin with.

Both Sasuke and Shikamaru had been startled enough at Naruto's answer that he had gotten away before they recovered. He had told them; "The same reason they wanted Sabaku no Gaara, Yugito of Cloud and Uzumaki Naruto-kun."

Which had led him to now. When it became apparent that he wouldn't be able to reach the deep cut on his back, Naruto had been forced to seek help from one of his few true friends; his trusted confidant and sometimes lover, Lady Jubei, Master of the Yagyu Jubei Shinkage (**AN**: Sword Arts. Similar to Dojos from what I understand) and therefore Ruling Lady of the Jubei Clan, one of the Village-less Clans recently settled on one of the uninhabited Wave Islands, thus creating the highly secretive Hidden Storm Village (in honour of Naruto, not that anyone told him _that_).

Nanohana Jiyu, more publicly known as Lady Jubei, was a shapely and athletic woman of slightly above average height. Her hair, her favourite physical attribute, was bound into a pair of long, dark brunette braids that fell like small whips to mid-thigh. Her single eye, a deep, warm brown wreathed in long dark lashes, was aggressive and stern, but not unkind. The other eye, under the clan Kekkai Gekkai 'Devil's Eye', was covered by an odd heart-shaped eye-patch; the only feminine item she wore frequently. Her face was undeniably attractive, and though it would usually be called cute, the serious, even stern, expression seldom leaving her countenance leant her face a gravity none could mistake for anything but someone used to commanding a fighting force.

Jubei was driven by a deep-seated determination to protect and secure her Clan's position in the world, rivalled only by her hatred of the Iwakage, the murderer of her mother and brother. She and a few of her guards had run across him being harried by Iwa Hunter-nin while on his way to visit Tazuna and his family in Wave just after his exile from Konoha. Naruto had looked too much like the Yondaime Hokage for old hostilities to be ignored.

After they had killed the Hunter-nin and put the corpses into storage scrolls for examination later, Jubei had ordered the unconscious boy only a few years younger than herself to be taken him back to the compound for medical attention. The two had grown close during his recuperation, even more so once he eventually told her about his exile. It was several years before she found out about the Kyuubi, but she handled it better when she found out the emotional reasons he had kept it from her.

The Clan were grateful when Jubei began to feel again thanks to Naruto, and he was treated with just as much respect and fondness as one of their own when he stopped in during his footloose wanderings. Especially since he was in the habit of bringing orphaned children from the other Hidden Villages to them, swelling their ranks with new blood and several bloodline abilities. To this day, he had brought a total of one hundred and fifty-two children to Hidden Storm, all of them exceptionally talented.

Naruto never told anyone, but the Kyuubi was strongly drawn to natural talent, bloodline abilities and raw power, making it easier to find these children.

There was a scratching at the rice-paper sliding door and it slid open to let Inari, the grandson of Tazuna, in with the requested medic-kit, followed by Koji, his small, quiet apprentice. Naruto was already removing his black undershirt before Inari reached him, his coat already discarded and on its way to the seamstress for mending.

Inari had been accepted into the Jubei Clan like the other children Naruto had brought to them, two in five children from the Wave villages were also accepted if they had talent. He was now a jounin in the Elite Maelstrom Squad (again in honour of Naruto, not that anyone told him _that_ either who were the Storm's equivalent of Konoha's ANBU. He was tall and slender, his dark brown hair pulled up in a samurai pony-tail, leaving his surprisingly handsome face and big black-brown eyes in stark relief. He had taken very well to the Jubei Shinkage sword-techniques and was better than most who had been training since early childhood. He was also a first-rate medic-nin.

Incidentally, Inari was also one of Naruto's on-again-off-again fuck-buddies (that Jubei actually _knew_ about). It was more a relieving of stress with a friend than any desire for a relationship. All of Naruto's lovers were aware that he never wanted an ongoing relationship deeper than comradeship or friendship, and he never even looked at someone who wanted more.

But then, Storm-nin had begun to garner a reputation for being loose, Naruto acknowledged. It probable had to do with their reluctance to get married and commit, which wasn't a problem if there was a child. After all, all children were left in the communal nursery with a wet-nurse so as to allow female nin to get back to duty as soon as possible.

Naruto hissed and jerked out of his thoughts when a lance of pain shot through his body.

While lost in his mind, Inari had moved behind him, peeled away the gauze he had managed to get over the wound and pressed the edge lightly. Something gave.

"Shit." Was hissed behind him, then "Koji, go get Haruka-san and Kenshin-kun. The wound's festered. Naruto? Can you lay on the futon, please? On your stomach?"

Naruto did so and watched as the small dark genin left the room.

Two shinobi Naruto vaguely recognised entered the room while he half-drowsed. He started in surprise when, after softly talking with Inari, the two men held down his shoulders while Inari himself straddled his lower back. Naruto then became aware that something was wrong when he couldn't gather the strength to throw them off, which he should have been able to do.

Then he wondered why he should want to. He trusted Inari.

He forced himself to relax.

Words came to him, but his mind began to fog rapidly and pain screamed from his back before he could understand what was said to him. Pressure was applied along the wounded strip of his back, causing blood and other things to flow. Through the universes exploding before his eyes, he caught sight of a wad of gauze being dumped into a basin placed near the futon; it was covered in globs of thick greenish pus stained with blood.

He was only vaguely aware of anything anymore. The room became unbearably bright, there was a loud whining noise and the room was hot. He had the oddest sensation of falling through the pain in his back and, more recently, his throat as he screamed himself hoarse. His eyes cleared for a moment and he saw that there were more people in the room, shouting. Through everything, he met the usually black, concerned gaze of the orphan child, Koji, standing in the corner of the room.

They were spinning two-tiered Sharingan.

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	3. Chapter 3

**_Disclaimer:_** I do not own anything recognised as belonging to other people.

All questions shall be addressed at some point in the story.

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His fevered sleep was full of odd dreams.

He saw a battlefield bathed in blood and severed limbs, a solitary figure standing silhouette against a blood-washed sky. Fighting many upon many of mindless, faceless dolls that bled but never made a sound. The thick coppery aroma of blood hung in the air of a dark room and upon his skin as he thrust into a screaming, wanton woman beneath him, her nails cutting into his back, and he laughed.

The laughter continued long after the dream faded into half-awareness. It was a laughter more terrible than any sadness – a laughter that was mirthless as the smile of a snake, a laughter cold as the frost and partaking of the grimness of infallibility. It was a masterful and incommunicable wisdom of eternity laughing at the futility of life and the effort of life.

The dream shifted and he dreamt of a dark warm den, entangled in the limbs of his den mates, feeling strongly of home. Of long red paws that leapt and bound over new snow after a white hare. Of hunting prey through a night wood, the scent of fear and heat strong in his nostrils.

At some point he opened his eyes -Did he?- and regarded the majestic crimson fox that stood like some god's totem behind the bars of his prison, just as its glowing red eyes regarded him. There was a totally inhuman emotion in the creature's eyes; total neutrality, endless patience and the knowledge that it was Eldest, no matter what any pitiful two-legged creature thought. It would be remembered by the planet when humans were legends and books were written by rabbits.

He bowed before the indomitable will of the great Kyuubi No Yoko.

The Kyuubi No Yoko regarded the man before it and gave a slow, stately nodded in return. It did not love the human -it was a fox and thus immune to such human notions- but it held some warmth, even affection, for him, and thus it would purge the body of the poison in its bloodstream. For Him. Only Him.

Naruto turned and wandered back into the debris of his mind when the fox turned its attention away, intent on re-establishing his scattered concept of Self.

It was a parade; Face after face rose up in his mind, followed by emotions in regard to that person and the reason for this concept of them. People he had nearly forgotten from Konoha, the siblings from Sand and their circle of despair, Zabuza of Hidden Mist, the Demon Brothers, dearest Haku who was the third person he truly loved and the first he lost, Old Man Sarutobi smoking his pipe, Ichiraku cooking ramen and chatting to him, Ayame young and smiling at him though he knew she had long since married and birthed a son, Iruka with his mouth full and looking at him in surprise, his mother figure Tsunade giving him a nookie, Jiriaya the pervert teaching him Rasengen, Kakashi's one-eyed smile when he mastered the tree-climbing exercise, Hinata tapping her fingers and blushing, Shikamaru helping him with homework when they were small, eating with Choiji, Neji smiling at him, playing with Kiba and Akamaru, Sakura, once loved, now loathed…Sasuke whom he had thought himself in love with and who had carved out Naruto's heart for power with the Chidori, unwittingly creating Silence.

The faces began to blur as they passed into recent years.

Then a voice rang out.

The voice itself was a desolation, lifeless, without emotion, so lone and cold that the spirit of it was not even that of emptiness. It was the voice of the Kyuubi No Yoko.

"**_Wake_**."

Naruto woke.

(**space)**

Naruto blinked open his bright blue eyes and looked around a pleasantly dim room he recognised as his own room in the Jubei main house. He had been in one of the officer's rooms in the shinobi barracks.

There was a trio of genin sleeping on futons by the Westerner's bed while their jounin instructor, a sixteen-year-old genius who had been amongst the first he had brought to the Jubei Clan, stood looking out the window. Naruto had given him the name Kohaku. Kohaku was also from the nearly destroyed clan of the Hyouton users and looked uncannily like Haku, only his hair was several shades darker and he wasn't as kind-hearted. Indeed, he was quite ruthless.

But, oddly enough, he was totally devoted to Naruto, just as Haku had been to Zabuza, since a young age. There was nothing the boy wanted more than to have the blonde's regard, but Naruto, subconsciously sensing this obsessive, jealous nature, had held back from the boy in the hope that his devotion turned someone more capable of dealing with it. This failed spectacularly as he tried harder to gain Naruto's affection and respect. Naruto likened it to Sasuke's obsession with Itachi, almost.

He had never told Kohaku about his namesake and hoped to never have to do so.

Naruto closed his eyes and prayed Kohaku hadn't noticed he was awake. He hoped he could either go to sleep again soon or at least for the guard to change. But it was not to be. Kohaku had noticed his movement in the window's reflection.

"Do you hate me?"

Naruto opened his eyes again and stared up at the waterfall scene he had had painted on the ceiling above the bed for when he was ill or injured. He greatly wished he could have sighed. He stayed silent for a while, the question hanging in the air for a time before he answered.

"No."

"Then why? Why do you reject me time and time again?"

The blonde kept his voice low and calm as opposed to the frantic note in Kohaku's. "You want from me more than I can give you."

He turned sharply, his face distressed. "But the others-!"

Naruto closed his eyes. He did sigh this time as Silence came out of the White Place and he slipped into the persona like a well-worn glove. "They know me better than to expect of me what you do. I was born alone. I was raised alone. I trained alone. I carry out my missions alone. And I shall die alone. This is my wish. You desire to stay beside me in all things. This makes me, who is used to never being tied down, chaff. I do not want one as high-maintenance as you."

There was a painful silence and Kohaku turned back to the window. Silence could practically feel the stiffness in the young genius. Silence spoke again presently.

"I shouldn't have let you get attached, but you looked so much like him that I couldn't help myself."

He heard Kohaku turn slightly. His voice was trying to be angry, but curiosity was winning out.

"Who?"

"Haku."

"Haku? Who is Haku?"

"He was someone very precious to me. He must have been a close cousin to you because you both look uncannily alike and you both have the same Kekkai Gekkai."

"Was?"

"I only really spoke to him three or four times in the week or so I knew him, but he made a massive impact on my life. He made me realize just how precious my precious people are to me. He was my first love, but he was also one of the first enemy ninja I ever fought. He fought and died for his precious person, despite his inherent kind-hearted nature." Naruto reopened his eyes, Silence gone and tears in his eyes for a boy who had died more than a decade before. "He said that for his precious person he would kill his heart." A tear fell. "But he never killed. He was too nice. And you are not nice at all." The last was a whisper and Naruto fell into a restless sleep for a few hours.

**(space)**

He was woken again when the door slid open and Lady Jubei stepped into the room, flanked by Inari and a Hyuuga girl with sleek, short black hair and clad in a short crimson robe. Inari nudged one of the genin with his boot.

In moments, three sheepish genin were lined up along the wall and making a smashing effort to be invisible.

Jubei, however, ignored them and the blank-faced Kohaku and strode towards the wounded form on the bed. Without further ado, she swung her leg over, straddled Naruto's waist and shoved her tongue down his throat.

He didn't want to antagonize Kohaku, but Jubei would get upset if he didn't kiss her back, so he lifted his arms and held her close around the waist, hoping she would get the hint that he didn't want kissing, just close contact.

Jubei caught the hint and slid to the side, hugging into the crook of his shoulder.

Inari grinned and took a flying leap onto the bed, bouncing the two occupants about a foot into the air, inspiring shouts of irritation as they struggled to regain position and made a joint effort to pummel Inari with pillows.

Hyuuga Nara was a girl whom Naruto had rescued from a Cloud dungeon where she was being kept until she was of breeding age. She had been kidnapped at a young age and thus wasn't given the Caged Bird Seal. Everyone outside Hidden Storm believed her dead in a mysterious fire.

Nara noticed everything in the room with her, having honed her Byakagen to phenomenal levels. She knew Kohaku was in love with Naruto and she knew Naruto wanted nothing more than comradeship with Kohaku, so she noticed right away that Kohaku was more miserable than usual.

She jerked her head at him and he left the room willingly, hurriedly even, his genin team trotting after him.

That was odd. He usually hesitated to leave a room if Naruto was there.

She turned her attention back to the bed where the three had just started to settle down. She spoke with an abruptness that made all three pause.

"You have been unconscious for eleven days."

Naruto looked up, a shadow of his old self on his face and in his voice. "What?!

Jubei smiled at him, a little amused by the totally shocked look on his face. "There was a poison in the wound on your back and the one on your arm that caused a deep infection and hit the bloodstream a little before you got here." She paused and added very seriously. "If the Kyuubi's chakra hadn't flushed out your bloodstream and shed the dead flesh, you wouldn't have survived. As it was, Kimari wanted to take off your arm. We only just managed to convince him otherwise when he realised the one on your back was much worse and you probably wouldn't live anyway."

Naruto hunched his shoulders a little and peered apologetically out of his semi-long bangs at Jubei, Inari and Nara. "I'm sorry. You all must have been worried."

Inari and Jubei shared a look and simultaneously pulled him down to lie on the mattress between them. They both cuddled him and murmured reassurances, even Nara came to settle on the edge of the big Westerner bed.

Naruto curled over and let the two ninja spoon him, even Nara was rubbing his foot in an unconscious gesture of assurance. It wasn't because Naruto himself was upset, but it was rather to let them reassure _themselves_ that Naruto was alive and awake.

He began to doze again, his ear pressed against Jubei's breast and listening to her heartbeat through her navy-blue outfit just as he always did after their lovemaking, Inari's arms wrapped around his waist and holding him flush against his chest. In his drifting, mostly asleep state, Naruto vaguely remembered being held like this before, when the three of them were younger, but there were no clothes in the way then.

The door slid open and the blonde opened one eye. Nara's hand paused a moment before continuing, Jubei lifted her head enough to see before settling again and Inari half-rolled over since his back was towards the door.

"Koji? What is it?"

Naruto frowned, his eyes once again closed. There was something about Koji that he was supposed to remember.

A young male voice, soft as nightfall, drifted across the room. "The envoys from Hidden Leaf are demanding your presence, Jubei-sama. They are most adamant that they see you now."

The woman sighed. "Tell them that they can bloody well wait until I'm finished here. I'll probably only be an hour at most."

"Jubei-sama." Koji acknowledged, presumably bowed, and left.

Naruto roused himself enough to ask a question. "Leaf envoys?"

Jubei stroked the fur-like blond hair soothingly. "Leaf's getting ready for war with Sound. Everyone's picking sides; Leaf and Sand against Sound, Rain and Rock. Grass, Waterfall, Cloud and Mist have withheld their votes until they find out who gives them the best bribes. Sound, Sand and Leaf have sent envoys to try to sway us to their sides."

"And?"

Inari chuckled behind him, hips rubbing against the back of Naruto's pelvis. "She's been pretending that she's overrun with paperwork and minor skirmishes that take her out of the Village of Storm. It's driving Leaf and Sound nuts, though the Sand nins have caught on and are laughing themselves silly at the expense of the other two. None of them have seen either hide or hair of her since their arrival."

Naruto snickered quietly for a moment before he wriggled a bit. "Can you kind of let me up? I need to use the toilet." He paused and shifted. "And a shower. I'm pretty sure the crustiness on my back is from body-fluids I don't think should be there."

Jubei let out a loud squawk and Inari joined her in loud snickering. Naruto blinked a few time and looked up to find Nara smiling at him with amused pity. He blinked again until he realised what it sounded like.

"Oh." Pause. "Ooh." Longer pause. "Oh! You sick perverts! I meant wound fluids!" He struggled into a sitting position and held a hand out to Nara. "Help me up, would you?"

Nara complied and assisted the naked blond off the bed and let him lean on her to the bathroom door, giving Inari and Jubei a perfect view of what they thought was the perfect arse.

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	4. Chapter 4

**_Disclaimer:_** I do not own anything recognised as belonging to other people.

Yes, there shall be yaoi, but there shall also be het as well. Naruto, in my story, is neither monogomous nor entirely straight.

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Soon Naruto was relaxing under a near-scalding hot shower, the beat of the water slothing the residue of dead skin and seepage from his skin, as well as the smell of battle and fever sweat. Overall, he was nearly in heaven as the water washed away the filth he hadn't really been aware of until it started coming off.

Naruto…he did most of his thinking in the shower or, sometimes, after sex; therefore, while sometimes genius, his plans were usually also a little weird and took great leaps of logic to understand. Problem was, to the chagrin of sceptics, they always worked better than anything anyone else could come up.

So here he was, using a sponge on a stick and scrubbing along the diagonal nine-inch scar he knew would fade in a few days, and he was contemplating the pros and cons of alliances with either side.

Now, Naruto had to admit, he loathed Konoha, and if some people he still considered precious to him didn't live there, he would have gone out of his way to raze the place to the ground. Cause, let's face it, ninja are not heroes: they are weapons who do the bidding of anyone who pays. Glorified mercenaries, if you will.

But that is a biased opinion.

Strategically and politically, much of Wave's, and thus Storm's, economy came from trade agreements with Fire Country and Wind Country. Not coming to their aid could seriously cripple Wave for the several years it would take to find new trade-partners.

But they could also cause problems if they joined the other side for probably the same reasons.

There was no doubt that the Otokage (still snake-face Orochimaru), the Raikage (the guy who put Nara through hell and back) and the Iwakage (i.e. the guy who killed) Jubei's mom and bro) were all full-fledged insane psychopaths who would probably turn on one another like rabid dogs when Leaf and Sand were crushed.

It would probably, however, be in Storm's better interests to stay neutral. Despite being powerful shinobi and having a larger fighting force than any other Hidden Village, Hidden Storm promoted close familial bonds between its ninja and the training and raising of kids was a group effort. The rice fields on the neighbouring islands of Aki and Gin were finished and they were expecting the first crop in a few months. The orchards and fisheries on Toru were going well, the sheep, cattle and poultry on Midori would be functional to support the seven villages on the larger islands in four years while it was expected the silk being cultivated on the newly christened Aya would bring a lot of trading to Wave as soon as the first samples a were sent out to the other major villages.

Naruto paused. Really, aside from the initial trade setbacks and political hostility, Wave came out on top during this war if it stayed neutral.

_And I may not have to see Sasuke-teme ever again._ Naruto thought, almost cheerfully.

_-Red eyes-_

Naruto shrugged off the feeling of forgetting something.

-_Sharingan-_

Pale gold eyebrows came closer together in a confused frown. What was Kyuubi hinting at? The fox seldom bothered to help unless it was important or it was bored.

-_Sasuke-_

Images of Sasuke when they were younger with his Sharingan active. The Chidori racing towards his chest. The hard man it had taken Sasuke three years to become standing at Orochimaru's side. The handsome man coming at Naruto for saving his life, long black tresses flowing behind him and thwarted murder in his twirling red eyes.

_-Itachi-_

Itachi as stoic as ever as he casually broke his brother's arms. That gleam in his eyes as he killed Konoha ANBU. Chatting to one another, drunk and amiable, in a small Rice Country bar, to intoxicated to even consider fighting. The almost affectionate smirk as he pulled his fist back to deliver a knock-out blow to Naruto's abdomen. A small, dark child peering around the black and red Akatsuki cloak. Concern in those three tiered red eyes.

"_His mother is gone. He is all I have left; I don't want him to live the same life I do. Will you take him to Storm?"_

"_I will."_

Blue eyes widened. He had nearly forgotten.

A dark inn room, a small boy asleep in a single bed. Big black eyes staring at him with childish curiosity._ "When is daddy coming back, Naruto-sama?"_ Introducing the boy to Inari, asking him to keep an eye on him until he was old enough for Naruto to train him. Concerned Sharingan watching him from the corner.

-_Koji-_

Naruto dropped the soap. He was supposed to start training Koji two years ago; Koji was thirteen now. Naruto had been informed that Koji had completed the Shinobi Academy nine months after he had arrived at age seven and had opted to remain with Inari as an apprentice rather than be sorted into a genin team.

Naruto washed off the soap, turned off the water and grabbed a towel. While rubbing himself down, he wondered if he should take on a genin team; he'd already decided to stay this time. He knew he was going to start training Koji, if he wanted it, but he thought it would be good for the boy to work in a team.

Having gotten his long hair as dry as he could with a towel, Naruto grabbed his ember-red lined black yukata, dragged it on and left the bathroom.

The three members of the Storm Supreme Council were still in the room but had migrated to sitting cushions in the corner so the maids could change the sheets. They had been joined by Hikari Satoshi and Niwa Daisuke.

Satoshi, a pale, cold boy with white skin, blue eyes and neat, pale blue hair, was fourteen, yet another prodigy, and carried his own wind-chill factor around with him. Daisuke, contrarily, was a bright, cheerful, naïve boy with creamy skin, ruby-red eyes and fly-away hair the colour of flames. Despite what most people thought, Daisuke was also a prodigy, just a more precise. Satoshi headed the Investigations Division of the Storm police force while Daisuke was a thief, assassin and information gatherer assigned to no particular division or corps.

Odd thing was that the two were best friends from two near extinct clans that loathed one another; Ice and Fire, Light and Dark, Ying and Yang, two sides of the same coin and all that crap. Naruto had suspected Satoshi was smitten with Daisuke from the day he had agreed to take Satoshi and his brother from his desperate mother, adding the boys to his group of seven children at the time. Daisuke had attached himself to the other boy since he was the only person close to his own age. Kohaku and Koji had also been in that group.

The missing three from what had been dubbed 'Team 7' consisted of Satoshi and Daisuke's elder brothers and a girl from Earth Country. The elder brothers, Krad and Dark respectively, loathed one another. Naruto suspected there was a lot of sexual tension between the two. Worse was that the girl, Amaya, was their third wheel and would alternate her attentions between the two. It wasn't that she was being cruel (though she was part of the Interrogations squad), it was just that she loved them both, they both loved each other (or at least seriously lusted) and they both loved her. The love triangle was the popular drama of Hidden Storm; it irritated the hell out of Naruto because it reminded him, to an extent, of his own genin years.

"What's up?" The little red-head enquired when Naruto remained hovering in the doorway.

Naruto smiled. "Just wondering how I'm going to get Dark and Krad locked in the same utility closet."

Satoshi and Daisuke shared a conspiring look.

Jubei waved it away, intent on politics. "What's your opinion on the war?"

Naruto shrugged when he was settled on his cushion. "Stay neutral. Wave'll be eighty-six percent self-sufficient in four years anyway. So there's no real need to get involved."

Everyone stared.

"What?"

Nara shifted uncomfortably. "Well, since you're from Konoha and remember more of it than I do, we thought you might have been for joining the war."

To say Naruto looked surprised was an understatement. "Come again? I thought you said I wanted to _help_ Konoha." Really. The _nerve_! "If almost anyone in that Village was drowning, I wouldn't throw them a rope if they offered me all their worldly possessions and their first-born child. I _loath_ that town."

There was an embarrassed silence before it was broken by a detached voice with it own arctic chill. "You know, I would have thought you would have seen that coming."

The three council members shot looks at Satoshi; and not the kind that inspired the warm and fuzzies.

Naruto gave a half-amused smile and waved it away.

"I'm not just saying not to get involved in the way because of my personal …disinclination towards Konoha, though there is that. It's just that we don't really _need_ to get involved in the war on either side. In under four years we will be exactly eighty-six percent self-sufficient, at which point we will be exporting more than importing." Naruto paused a moment before adding, "Though it may be prudent to have a quiet conference with the Kages from the other neutral ninja villages, including the smaller, mostly-insignificant ones, about how you will deal with the victors of war, not to mention how you're gonna trade around the kill zone."

Jubei turned to Inari and said, somewhat smugly, "And you wondered why he's my First Adviser."

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Much obliged if you'd review. Thanks for reading. 


	5. Chapter 5

**_Disclaimer_**: I own nothing recognised as belonging to someone else.

**Pairings:** NarutoxEVERYONE. A few JubeixNaruxInari moments and eventual NaraxNeji...maybe.

Also, another crossover towards the end. Cuddos if you can guess where she's from.

* * *

The six ninja continued to debate through until lunch, ironing out details. This took six or seven hours, then a genin runner arrived to inform them that the Konoha envoys were on the verge of declaring war (something none of the council actually thought they had the authority to do, but broke up their meeting anyway), and Jubei was forced by Inari meet them immediately in the third Council Chamber while runners were sent to collect the envoys from Sound and Grass; Inari providing an escort to make sure she actually got there and didn't take off. Daisuke and Satoshi wandered off as well, presumably to find a conveniently empty room or an out-of-the-way broom closest. Nara was nowhere to be found, though he had suspicions about the open sliding door that led to his walled-in private garden. 

Stretching the kinks out of his limbs from sitting so long, the blonde ninja wandered over to his walk-in wardrobe, stripping of his yukata along the way. Draping the black robe on a randomly placed chair, he rubbed an odd set of scars that looked like claw marks on his right hip, mirror images of the ones on his left; parting gifts from the affections of the Vessel of the Seven-Tailed Demon Dog.

Kyuubi had not been happy with him for dallying with his species' natural enemy and had damned well let him know it by making him heal like a normal human after he found out what was going on; hence the scars. There were pale marks running the length of his back too.

Now, even Naruto had to admit that he was a bit of a slut when the mood took him. I mean, it's not exactly what you'd call _normal_ to fuck someone who's out to catch you to extract your inner demon and thus killing you (_coughItachicough coughDeideracough_), nor lust after someone who mangled their team-mate/best friend in an attempt to gain power(_coughSasukecough)_, nor to fuck just about anyone unattached, attractive, powerful and would have him that he came across in his travels.

But Naruto wouldn't sleep with just anyone; there were specific requirements. They had to be above average ANBU level, at least either prodigy level or exceptionally talented, they had to be attractive, above average intelligence (taking into account the level of power required, intelligence is practically a given considering the shinobi survival rate), attractive and preferably not trying to kill him (though he was willing to overlook this since he had actually turned a good fight into mind-blowing sex on more than one occasion (most notably when he ran across Deidera without Sasori in Wind Country last year)). _Basically_, Jubei had summarised for him, 'slightly' inebriated and after he had listed his requirements, also 'slightly' inebriated, though not to the same extent of the woman he had just had sex with, _What he wanted was a dominant who was powerful enough to meet him on mostly the same levels and not break. 'Breed with the strongest mates' kind of instincts._

It was just unfortunate that most of the people fitting his requirements were criminals and/or psychopaths.

And, no, it didn't help that demon foxes were reputed to be amorous at the best of times.

Naruto vaguely wandered if Kyuubi had thrown him into heat again, what with his mind mostly fixated on sex since this morning. The fox tended to do that when it was bored because Naruto's grasp of consciousness sometimes slipped enough that the fox could temporarily take control of the body and have his way with whomever Naruto was currently entertaining.

A pointed cough behind him let him know that he had, in fact, been standing naked in his walk-in closet, lost in thought, for quite some time. Not bothering to turn around, Naruto grabbed a set of tan training apparel, dragged them on and turned around.

And tried to hold in a grimace when he saw who was leaning against the door frame.

With the straight black ponytail hanging to just below his shoulder-blades, two long locks loose from the band but tucked behind his ears, slightly blush pale skin and the prettiest pair of seal eyes you ever did see, the dainty, slender Koji was a boy almost too pretty to be a ninja. While it was very obvious that he was male, Koji almost always reminded Naruto of a porcelain doll. And then he would deliberately remind himself of that time he saw Koji snapped an elite Iwa-Hunter-nin's neck with his dainty white hands at the innocent age of nine.

Koji was most definitely his father's son in terms of temperament and skill, but the blonde suspected he had a lot of Sasuke's obsessive tendencies. Itachi insisted that Koji looked just like his mother and Naruto never met the woman, Sohma Rin or something, to be able to dispute it. Most people mistook his standoffish and soft-spoken manner as shyness but Naruto knew Koji was a super-predator through and through, quietly waiting for his time to strike.

Naruto never told anyone, but he strongly suspected that, given sufficient motivation, Koji had the potential to become an even greater threat than Orochimaru and the entirety of Akatsuki combined.

He also suspected that if Koji hadn't liked him so very much, he probably wouldn't have waited for so long for Naruto to train him. Probably would have eventually planned his demise for forgetting to train him like he promised years ago. He didn't know whether or not Koji's nearly endless patience was a blessing or a curse.

At the moment, Koji's fondness was mostly based on Naruto's personality and knowing him better than most others, though since the onset of puberty, he had begun to find Naruto physically attractive.

Naruto honestly was a little disturbed that Koji had no problems watching him get dress and had no problems letting Naruto know he enjoyed it.

"You know, it's kinda creepy when you do that." The blonde told the boy as he put his arms though the armholes.

Koji shrugged nonchalantly, still watching the man dress. "There's a man who arrived with another Jounin and three genin last week. Uchiha Sasuke."

Naruto attempted to freeze in the act of pulling on a sandal, resulting in toppling onto his arse. Most undignified for a Shinobi of his disposition.

'_Ohshitohshitohshitohshitohshitohshit-'_

"You know him." It was not a question.

This time, Naruto really did grimace. "Oh, my, yes. We were in the same genin cell from before I was thrown out of Konoha." One pale hand unconsciously rose and rubbed a smooth silvery patch next to his heart. Dark eyes noted the gesture. "In fact, he was the _excuse_ for me being thrown out of Konoha."

"Hn." The thoughtful look on the boy's face was deceptively mild, but anyone who could read the boy anywhere near as well as the blonde could, would know that Koji was probably planning a rather nasty surprise for someone.

"He's your uncle; your father's little brother and the only one he let survive his clan genocide."

"Hn." It didn't look like Koji was going to let something as insignificant as a little blood relation stand in the way of his 'accident'.

"I think, maybe, because Itachi wants him to get strong enough to be a challenge."

Sigh. "Fine. Whatever floats his boat." The young ninja turned attention back to the man binding his wrists with white and tan wraps. "I don't believe I have ever heard the entire reason for your expulsion from Konoha; just that the main motive behind it was the Sealing of the Kyuubi in you as a newborn and anyone else would not have received any punishment at all, let alone anything so severe."

Naruto grabbed a brush and hair tie before wandering past Koji into the main bedroom and out onto the garden veranda where he sat down on the steps to brush out the golden stands.

"It'll take a few minutes so sit down." Once Koji had settled onto one of the veranda railings, Naruto began the story of 'Naruto's Time With Team Seven'. "I actually graduated from the Ninja Academy on my third and final try, though that was by fluke." Koji made a disbelieving sound. "No, I'm serious. Even then I was placed as Dead Last. Anyway, I was place with the Rookie of the Year and the highest scoring kunoichi to balance out my low scores. I mostly got bad grades because no one would ever help me understand the work and my chakra was too large for bunshins and henges to work properly for me, even at that age. My team mates were Uchiha Sasuke and Haruno Sakura; the Uchiha Survivor/Avenger, a chronic depressive with a deep-seated need to belittle everyone around him, and a rabid fangirl more worried about her appearance than being a ninja.

Our sensei, a Jounin called Hatake Kakashi aka the Copy-Cat Ninja, was chronically late and didn't put any effort into training either Haruno or myself, instead choosing to basically ignore us in favour of Sasuke because of his Sharingan. Sakura could take care of herself since she was able to visit the library without getting lynch-mobbed, but I was fobbed off on other people like Jiraiya and Ebisu.

Sometime during the Chuunin Exams, Orochimaru gave Sasuke the Curse Seal and I was able to beat Gaara of the Sand where Sasuke failed. Before that, we were mostly rivals, but he was also my best friend and almost my brother." Here Naruto paused, brush now held loosely in his hands, a sad frown marring his face and staring at the blank wall on the other end of the garden. "I loved him once." The admission was a sad, plaintive murmur. If he had looked at Koji, he would have seen the look of pure vengeance on the boy's face at the tone of the admission. And possibly just a tidge of jealousy.

Naruto mused before moving on. "After several fights with opponents where I came out better than he did, Sasuke attempted to leave Konoha for Otogakure. Nara Shikamaru, Inuzuka Kiba, Hyuuga Neji, Akimichi Choji and myself were sent to retrieve him. All of us by Neji were his year-mates and Neji was a year above us. Shikamaru was our Chuunin team leader. The Sound Five were dispersed to slow us down so Sasuke could reach Sound. If Gaara, his siblings and Rock Lee hadn't arrived to help us we would probably all have died. I found out later that both Neji and Choji nearly died. I went on ahead and fought Sasuke but I couldn't bring myself to hurt him and I had promised Haruno I would bring him back for her. He was trying to kill me to get the Mangekou Sharingan which could only be gained from killing the person closest to him. He put a jutsu called the Chidori through my chest, but when it really came down to it, he couldn't bring himself to kill me. Hatake turned up and took me back to Konoha to be healed. I was summoned to the council as soon as I was released and the rest is history."

The two sat in silence for a few moments before Koji got up and came to settle just behind the older man. Reaching around to take the brush from the unresponsive ivory hands, Koji finished brushing out the tangles and tightly braided the golden strands down his back.

Once done, Koji leant forward and wrapped his arms around Naruto's neck, burying his face into the back of his neck.

"I'll only wait so long, you know."

Naruto reached around and petted the boy awkwardly, grinning, the barest up-turning of lips. "I know. I'm going to talk to Jubei later about being assigned a genin team if you're interested."

He felt Koji smile into the back of his neck. "That sounds agreeable." He murmured somewhat smugly.

Kyuubi's prison turned his head slightly. "Anyone you want on the team, specifically? Though preferably a boy and a girl to meet cell requirements."

"Hmm…" The two ninja sat in silence while the youngest Uchiha thought.

Presently, Naruto shrugged off Koji's arms and moved onto the small paved area. He then proceeded with a warm-up workout reminiscent of various dancer, tumbler and acrobatic stretches.

The blonde was halfway through the third set of stretches when Koji's midnight voice drifted from the shade of the veranda. "What type of team are you trying for?"

Naruto continued onto the fourth set which involved bending over backwards and standing up straight again. "Preferably a full assault cell that has high Ninjutsu, Genjutsu, Taijutsu and Kenjutsu. Excellent speed, stealth and survival skills would also be a bonus. Intelligence is a must. I could probably come up with several other requirements but those are the bare basics. The purpose of my cell would be assault with good retreating and able to act as a multipurpose ninja unit."

Koji sighed. "That's going to make things just a teensy bit harder."

Naruto moved onto the fifth set of stretched.

"Well," Koji mused, "There is a girl from Class 3A, Hanajima Saki. She fits all the criteria except Taijutsu and Kenjutsu, but high in Genjutsu and Ninjutsu. She's from the fractured Hanajima Clan of Lightning Country. Her bloodline ability in the_ magunechikku tsukimono._ She's been known to curse people who hurt her friends, but she should sense someone coming, even if they're masking their chakra You brought her and her little brother and sister in about four years ago, I think."

Naruto nodded. He remembered her. Bright little thing, though kinda creepy for a kid.

"The boy…Tomoe Yasuo, I think. A native of Sand with the bloodline ability _Ikusa soshaku;_ berserker I think their calling them these days, though I think it's a highly incompetent way of explaining it if you ask me. It's so much more complicated then that. Anyway, his weaknesses are Genjutsu and a highly unprofessional fear of frogs."

Naruto snorted. "I'll be sure to use frogs in the secondary exam then."

The Kyuubi Vessel stood, finished his stretches and grinned at Koji in a manner that reminded him of a fox looking at a rabbit.

'_And Naruto wonders why people were jumping his bones left, right and centre_,' Koji thought, part amused, part appreciative.

"So Koji, how long's it been since someone grounded you into the dirt?"

Dark eyes narrowed in a glare that would make a snake look away. "Bring it on, blondie."

Naruto's smirk widened.

Uchiha pride was susceptible to Uzumaki taunts, regardless of age, rank or insanity.

**

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Press the prettiful blue button.

C'mon. You know you want to. ;3


	6. Chapter 6

**Pairings:** NarutoxEVERYONE. A few JubeixNaruxInari moments??x?? and eventual **Nara**xNeji...maybe.

**Response to Reviews:**

This'll be taking place over a number of years, so Koji/Naruto is a good possibility since he'll be doing pretty much everyone else...except a few, deprived people.

I've added another, more obscure crossover near the end, but he'll be cameo at worst and background character at best. Don't expect him to turn up often.

From Fruits Basket, I brought in Saki Hanajima, or 'Hana-chan', as the more obvious one, but Sohma 'Rin' Isuzu, the Zodiac of the Horse in the Fruits Basket manga, was also mentioned as Koji's deceased mother. 'Isuzu', from what i understand, means 'little bell' or something while 'Rin' can be interpreted as 'bell'. I can sort of see Rin and Itachi getting together and making a pretty Koji-like child. Their personailties just seem to run parallel.

The calling Sasuke, Sasuke and Sakura, Haruno was because there are three Uchihas he could be referring to, one of them laying all over him.

**26 Reviews! WOOT!**

_--The people who reviewed the last chapter suddenly hear a knock on their bedroom. They open their door to find a bag of their favourite cookies sitting innocently on the floor in front of them with a little not saying 'Thank You'--_

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"Iko in position."

"Kijo in position."

"Faita in position."

"Kitsune in position. Identify target."

"Target is in the gingko tree beside the flowering sakura vines."

"Acknowledged."

"Acknowledged."

"Acknowledged. Bring him down, people."

Three slender figures clad in formfitting black outfits and pale-grey armour shot out from their hiding places towards the gingko tree in question, blank white masks over their faces and black hoods covering their heads.

The wounded Oto-Chuunin made a break for it. After a few doges and a brief chase through the trees the Chuunin glanced back.

He felt a sudden constriction on his throat and a sudden bout of vertigo. His back slamming into the ground pushed all the air from his lungs. His last thought as he watched a fist come zooming towards his face was, '_Coathangered. How embarrassing…'_

**(space)**

Naruto tapped on the rice paper sliding door to Jubei's study where she was having a meeting with the Grass representatives.

"Enter."

The blonde entered silently and dropped to on knee before the desk, head bowed. He could feel the attention of everyone in the room, pricking the hairs on the back of his neck.

"What is it, Kitsune?"

"A team of Oto-nin were just caught and brought down trying to break into the Third Scroll Room."

"Casualties?"

"Only on their side. The Jounin leader and three of the four Chuunin are dead and being taken apart by the forensics squad. The remaining Chuunin obtained minor injuries before being rendered unconscious. He is currently in the care of Nara-san who is awaiting permission to continue with the interrogation."

"She has permission to continue. I want you to lead a team and back-trace the Oto-nin's path to the border. Deal with any you find any way you deem fit." Jubei turned to Inari, who was standing to her right. "Put a guard on each of Sound's envoys until I can have a word with them." She paused. "Konoha's too."

Inari and Naruto bowed their acceptance and disappeared in a swirl of mist.

**(space)**

The training grounds for the Hurricane Full-Assault Unit were mostly adjustable buildings and fortifications that assisted in close-quarters urban training. The ground Naruto arrived at was a fixed single story building made of concrete with twenty-seven rooms of varying size and was generally used as a target course with cut-outs of yakuza, shinobi (enemy and ally) and civilians. This course was designed to help ninja learn or entrench the ability to identify threat from hostage at a split-second's notice.

Naruto was hesitant to enter the maze of rooms because he knew the person in there took great pleasure in sneaking up on him and filling him full of sharp pointy objects.

But he wanted to talk to her now, so he would have to brave it.

He went in…

…And limped out three minutes later with thirteen senbon needles in his butt.

He paused a moment and pulled three out of his left cheek.

"Why do you always have to do that? Hell, why are all my precious people psychopaths?" The blond almost whined as he gave them back to their owner and pulled out two more.

The woman grinned. "Just lucky, I guess." The grin vanished, leaving her face grim. "I take it you're here about those tossers Konoha sent."

"Yeah." He grunted, pausing again to pull out three more. "Apparently, they sent their precious Uchiha to try to seduce Jubei-chan into an alliance."

The woman snorted in a very unladylike fashion, reaching out and single-handedly lifting the massive zanbatou off the bench on the way out of the walled-in grounds. "Do they know that she already has you and Inari yet?"

Naruto shrugged. "From what I understand, Jubei-chan was very chilly after Sasuke made a pass at her upon their first meeting. She's been side-lining him ever since. What she'd do if she ever found out he's the one who nearly killed me two weeks ago, I have no idea."

Both ninja paused, sharing a sly, sideways look, smirking.

"Now there's a thought." The woman murmured.

"Tenten? I like how you think."

"Of course," the former Konoha Kunoichi smirked smugly. "You wouldn't have put me in a position of power if you didn't."

Naruto shook his head, a slight smile on his lips.

Tenten, Scion of the Jubei Clan and Captain of the Hurricane Full-Assault Unit (one of the thirteen sectors that made up the Elite Maelstrom squad), had been quietly and illegally given a mission a year after his banishment by one of the Konohagakure council members, Danzo, along with three other, older Chuunin. She had been the only one to survive their homecoming reception long enough to run. She had been labelled a Missing-Nin in under an hour of her running, taking the information they were sent to retrieve with her. Wounded and with a terrifying number of Hunter-nin after her, Tenten had bolted for Wave country where the Hunter-nin had finally run her to the ground. She had been lucky to fall off a cliff into the sea below and even luckier to survive long enough to be washed up on the shores near the house of Tazuna the Bridgebuilder. She had stayed long enough that she caught one of Naruto's visits to the family and had returned with him to Hidden Storm.

Now just turned twenty-eight, Tenten was 6'2 feet with a figure reminiscent of a legendary heroine and corded with just enough muscle to show she was physically powerful but not enough to overpower her womanly curves like some Kunoichi did. Her appearance was also softened somewhat by her big molten-brown eyes and Double D-Cup chest that had sprouted at fifteen.

Finally finding that straight males drooled over a little exposed flesh (making them easier to kill), Tenten had traded her trademark pink shirt and navy pants for a dark green two-piece outfit vaguely reminiscent of the Madarin Lady style. The shirt was sleeveless and high-collared, but ended at midriff with a gap in the middle to show off some of her chest. The skirt was long and slit up the sides to the hip for maximum durability, but hung off her hips, allowing them to float over the wood-brown tights and lace-up knee-boots she wore under them. Regardless of style, her hair, now to her knees in burnished waves, was still fashioned in two, albeit larger, buns at the top-back of her head. And no one, and I mean NO ONE, could ever take away her love of sharp pointy objects and things that make bones go 'CRUNCH'.

She'd somewhere along the line adopted him as her little brother, reminding him scarily of Jubei-chan when they'd still regarded one another as siblings. But where Jubei was insinuative, Tenten, having grown up around males, was out and out vulgar. Naruto acknowledged that they'd probably have been in the same kind of relationship he was in with Jubei, if only she wasn't into the Loli-Shota types; preferably between the ages of fourteen and eighteen. From what he understood, her current lover was an eighteen-year-old Jounin in the Silent Breeze Unit called Mitsukuni "Honey" of the Haninozuka clan and looked like he should still be in the ninja academy.

But Naruto really didn't want to know about his big sister's fetishes, so he tried to block out those kinds of rumours.

"Why don't you go have a chat to Inari-kun after our Mission Briefing? Maybe let something slip, hm?" He paused again to pull out the remaining five needles.

Tenten's feral smirk was Kisame-Worthy.

Oddly for the two S-Rank nins, they didn't notice Shikamaru Nara down the path behind them, looking like he'd just be hit between the eyes with a industial-strength sledgehammer.

* * *

Tenten rocks. She is my all-time favourite female character in Naruto. She sooo doesn't get the screentime she deserves.

Iko:meaning Orphen. Same meaning as Koji.

Kijo: meaning witch. Hanajima is often called a witch by her classmates in Fruits Basket.

Faita: meaning Fighter.

Loli-Shota: Also, bishota refers to a beautiful, pre-pubescent male child or a child-like male, either of the age when one attends primary school or that his appearance is childish.

Whatever.

Pleez review. You just press this prettiful button down here. 83


	7. Chapter 7

**Disclaimer: Me no own, you no sue. Everyone happy?**

Sorry its been so long. I've had major writers block, but I hope the length helps.

There are a few more people from other anime in her because, lets face it, I'm lazy when it comes to making characters and there are perfectly good characters in other places, so why not use them?

Shikamaru and the rest of the Tree-Huggers will get their little get-together next chapter.

I meant to put it as 'Nara Shikamaru', last chapter, but it came out as 'Shikamaru Nara'. Sorry.

Koji is mine. -hugs Koji to chest and glares- MINE!

* * *

They had been bored, so he had decided to give them some exercise.

He was cursing his sentimentality right now.

For a ninja, being Very Bored (note the capitalisation) was possibly the worst possible thing that could happen.

Boredom amongst ninjas generally fell into the categories of "Genius at Work" or "Explosive Doom".

It was boredom that brought new jutsu of either magnificence or complete and utter uselessness into being (Case in Point: Hatake Kakashi's 'Thousand Years Of Pain').

It was boredom that drove inquiring minds to practice how to balance the pointy end of a kunai on the tip of their nose, without charka, whilst eating an ice-cream cone.

It was boredom that drove ninja to attempt to change their gender (Tenten still brought his Sexy no jutsu up on occasion, to his never-ending embarrassment.)

It was boredom that turned perfectly sensible people into morons and lunatics, casting common sense and decency to the wind.

It was boredom that told the ninja that doing something was a really good idea when really it was a really, really bad idea.

It was boredom that drove fully grown shinobi to act completely idiotically. Even ninja as stoic and cold-hearted as Koji were likely to succumb to this periodic epidemic.

Boredom could strike even the blackest of hearts, as seen with Itachi when he had confessed to Naruto that time in Rice Country, shit faced, to have been happily planning the mass genocide of his clan when, for no apparent reason, he got the urge to make a piñata entirely out of explosive tags, then incorporated it into the genocide plan because he 'wanted to see what would happen'. As it turned out, the glue used negated the explosive nature of the seals and gunpowder and had let out a smell reminiscent of a pack of dogs farting after eating rabbit guts.(1)

Another example would be Orochimaru with his Curse Seal (he must have been bored to have it revolve around biting someone).

In short, Naruto had decided that boredom was a Bad Thing.

Where was he?

Oh, yeah.

They had been bored, so he had decided to give them some exercise.

'They', being his Maelstrom Unit Captains. He'd forgotten what a pack of bloodthirsty maniacs they were when they hunted together.

Tenten, despite being his 'big sister', was a rabid bloodhound on the hunt who spoke baby-talk to her opponents whilst dive-bombing them from above with Zabuza's Kubikiri Houcho. She had honestly been the only person Naruto could ever see as truly appreciating the zanbatou on anywhere near the same level as the Mist-nin had. It was kinda creepy seeing her hack people to itty-bitty bits with the massive blade as she cackled gleefully. She was good at what she did, though, and that landed her the position of Captain of the Hurricane Full-Assault Unit at eighteen.

Yuuhi Sorath, Rath for short, was the twenty-five year old Captain of the Night Rain Hunter Unit. With wine-red eyes and thick, straight black hair that hung loose to his shoulder-blades, Rath was an attractive male with a slender but well-proportioned shape.

Rath was also the Jinchuuriki of the Seven Tailed Demon Dog and so was usually followed around by a pair of white snow-demon hounds. Incidentally, he was a distant cousin to Konoha's own Yuuhi Kurenai, but had little talent in Genjutsu.

Despite how his many fangirls thought he did sex (because of his calm, quiet and sometimes kind nature, they believed that he didn't 'fuck'…he 'made love') and his reluctance to take lovers ("He's saving himself for his one true love!"), his real reasons for not taking lovers outside the Jinchuuriki or super-fast healers was because, like all Jinchuuriki, he liked his sex with tooth, nail and inhuman force, but unlike some others, his Seal was weak, allowing the Dog Demon to influence certain aspects of him, making it impossible for any of the gentler styles of sex without being tied down. He'd accidentally killed his first lover, so he was understandably picky when it came to choosing lovers. Naruto, for his part, thoroughly enjoyed sex with Rath and neither let it interfere with working together.

Next was Toushiro (or 'Shiro-chan', to the boy's chagrin), Captain of the Blizzard Defence Unit. The Blizzard Unit mostly ran interference in battle, usually by way of smoke-screening with anything available whilst covering a retreat. It was a Unit that was scattered in small groups that patrolled the shoreline of the main continent and the Islands closest to it to act as a buffer from nosy ninja. A mandatory aspect of the Blizzard Unit was a proficiency in the 'Art' of Silent Killing.

As for Toushiro himself, he was a kid Naruto'd found abandoned and mostly-dead after going to investigate a large outburst of foreign energy. He'd been barely conscious when Naruto had asked him his name and had responded with 'Hiss-(gargle) Toussshhhiro'. Naruto had taken it to mean his family name started with 'Hi-something' and his given name was Toushiro. When he'd woken up again a few days later, he had remembered very little about himself except his training, his affinity with ice and weather, an almost phobia of warmth of any kind and the name 'Hinamori'. In his vulnerable and unstable emotional state, Toushiro had attached himself to one of the other children in the group, Mizuno Ami, and had yet to let go of his role as her protective older brother…Despite the fact that she was at least two months older than him.

Kyuubi didn't like Toushiro, or rather his energy (he wouldn't say why), which was similar to chakra by notably different, and, as such, had to be shaped differently. As a side-effect of Toushiro's odd energy, he was unable to use most Ninjutsu or Genjutsu and had to rely on his barely-remembered training. However, when it came to theory, Taijutsu, Kenjutsu and anything not chakra based, he proved to be a prodigy on almost the same level as Koji. It had really ticked the Uchiha off when Naruto's curiosity about Shiro-chan's energy had led to the two being closer than Naruto was to Koji as they worked out what few charka-based techniques could be adjusted to Toushiro's energy; mostly water, ice and wind based jutsus. Koji and Toushiro did not get along.

At all.

At roughly sixteen, Toushiro had let his death-white hair grow to just below his shoulder blades, offsetting his turquoise eyes prettily (it was common knowledge amongst the nin of Suto-mu that when his eyes turned silvery-blue, he was just as pissed off as when Naruto's eyes turned red). Toushiro's mastery of ice and sword techniques made him a dangerous opponent. The metal-smiths were baffled as to what the sword he appeared with was made of, but its special abilities worked for no one except the winter child.

Next was Hunny-chan (Formally Haninozuka Mitsukuni), Captain of the Silent Breeze Defence Unit, and his cousin, Morinozuka Takashi, Captain of the Zephyr Defence Unit. The Zephyr and Silent Breeze were the final defence force of Suto-mu, a last ditch fighting force that came into play when enemy ninja actually made it close to the more inhabited islands furthest from the mainland. When not at war, the Zephyr and Silent Breeze Units acted as the governing police force, each member of either Unit was paired up with a member of the other Unit as the Silent Breeze Unit focused on Taijutsu while the Zephyr Unit focused on Kenjutsu. Hikari Satoshi was technically a member of the Silent Breeze Unit.

Hunny-chan, Tenten's boyfriend, was eighteen and both looked and acted like he was twelve. Hunny-chan had sunny blond hair, big brown eyes and an adorable child's face. He liked sweets, Taijutsu, Tenten, his Bunny-chan (a pink bunny plushie) and his cousin/keeper, Takashi. Morinozuka Takashi, dubbed 'Mori-san' by Hunny-chan (it stuck) and said captain's second cousin, was over six feet tall with black hair, dark eyes and a stern, stoic countenance. He wasn't the most talkative type, but when he spoke, it was worth listening too. He specialised in Kenjutsu and used some Bushido (samurai) techniques. He had a strong desire to protect Hunny-chan and anyone whom he cared about or who just couldn't defend themselves. He was straight as a line, so Naruto respected his preferences and never made a pass at him.

Rider was the Captain of the smallest and most intense unit; the Still Air Unit. The Still Air Unit was information reconnaissance, possibly the most dangerous unit with the highest fatality rate of all thirteen of the Maelstrom Units. Field agents were trained for speed, hiding, sniping and escaping abilities while the urban agents were trained in people skills, disguise, creating false documents, forging, poisons/drugs and field torture.

As Captain, Rider had to have all the skills of both urban and field agents. Originally a Nuke-nin from Hidden Bamboo far to the west, she had originally joined Hidden Sound but had abandoned ship after she had been forced into an experiment that altered her eyesight to the point that she had to relearn how to use her eyes again. Now she saw in infra red and couldn't see in bright light, so she had to wear an eye mask and hunt with her other senses during the day. Naruto had beaten her in a fight (which had, strangely, not turned to sex), resulting in her acknowledging him as her alpha and following him to Storm.

Oddly for a Kunoichi so focused on her job, she wore her nearly ankle-length dusky purple hair loose to fall around her slender form. She was usually clad in a purple-lined black leather mini-dress, thigh-high black leather boots and matching shoulder gloves and choker; all of which Kunoichi usually avoided. Her weapons of choice were a pair of weighted metal stakes attached to long chains. Such was her talent that she could mesh perfectly into the shadows even whilst moving, making it incredibly difficult to track her optically. She made contortionists green with envy the way she twisted her body.

Naruto, personally, was reminded of an odd mix between Anko, Tenten and Kurenai. She was sly and sadistic, but with a strong pride and confidence in her abilities as a Kunoichi. Like Naruto, her life was made up of flings and one night stands with no real interest in a long-term relationship.

Then was Kaguya Shard, Captain of the Gale Unit. The Gale Unit was made up of Shinobi with offensive bloodline abilities like the Hyouton and the Corpse Bone Pulse. This unit was sent into places where it would be impossible to take weapons or anything else identified as belonging to a ninja. It was the most reclusive of the thirteen units.

Shard, the eldest of four children, was born to a woman from the Jubei Clan and a disowned member of the Kaguya Clan whose bloodlimit was recessive and skipped him. All of his children had the bloodlimit but not the hereditary diseased that caused aggression, insanity and eventual death.

Shard was tall, androgenous and a rather quiet individual with long silvery-white hair to his waist, calm icy-blue eyes and a soft white vulpine face. But unfortunately for Naruto, who wouldn't have been opposed to a little tumble between the sheets, he was also as straight as a pole.

Little Shiro-chan's younger sister (who was really older), Mizuno Ami, held rank as Captain of the Sleet Medical Unit, much to the chagrin of a certain white-haired boy.

The Sleet Medical Unit, as the name implied, was the medical unit. When not acting as Jubei's secretary, Inari was the first lieutenant of the Sleet Unit. Unlike most Medic-nins from other villages, all Shinobi in this unit had to be at least average Jounin level. Any Shinobi who chose to be a medic but were below the required level were merely considered medic-nin and not permitted to take the missions assigned to the Sleet Unit.

These missions included answering distress beacons and acting as field medic when any team was required to go on extended missions.

The Captain, Mizuno Ami, was only seventeen, but she was also a super genius when it came to theory and medicine. But, oddly enough, the only things about her skill in fighting that put her at Jounin level were her analytical skill, her chakra control and the ability to be able to predict where a blow or weapon would hit by instantly mathematising the trajectory and being able to move just enough that it either missed or landed a glancing blow. When her brilliant mind was applied to medicine, she could find out what was wrong with a person and usually fix it in a matter of hours; sooner if it was serious.

At slightly below average height, Ami had her silken blue hair cut short around her ears and her angular little face was often found buried in a book, her sapphire blue eyes scanning the page rapidly. While Ami was a member of the Hyouton clan like Haku and Kohaku, Ami's gift with her bloodline ability was comparatively small, allowing her to manipulate only seven litres on a good day. If she could, she would have spent all her time reading or working, so it was usually up to Toushiro and Inari to make her eat, sleep or even relax.

Then, of course, was Hyuuga Nara of the Razor Wind Interrogation Unit. The Interrogation Unit encompassed torture and interrogation, kidnapping, hostages and the testing and manufacturing of new weapons and poisons/drugs.

Nara was only a year younger than Naruto but possessed a deep tranquillity bordering on apathy. As far as Naruto knew, he and her three-year-old half-Hyouton-user daughter, Hinoto, were the only people in the world that she truly cared about. As far as she was concerned, all other loyalties were superfluous. Naruto was her precious person because he had been the first to show her true kindness and had taken her into a life other than the cold, dark cruelty of the underground detention camp. And she loved Hinoto dearly because she was the only other thing in the universe who made her feel like she deserved to live just as much as anyone else; that she wasn't useless or unwanted.

It was often that Nara reminded the blond Jinchuuriki of a porcelain doll; even more so than Koji. She stood at a tiny 4'11ft and had a dainty, delicate bone structure. Her skin was an almost paper white, pale enough that the blue of her veins stood out starkly in her arms. Since she spent most of her younger life away from any kind of bright light, her skin had never developed enough pigments to give her a natural colour, so she looked ethereal with her short, glossy black hair and wide white eyes. She appeared ageless and yet very young, wearing a look of wide-eyed, child-like blankness, like she didn't know how to react to a social situation.

That is not to say she was weak. Her weapons of choice were throwing kunai sheathed in the large bell-sleeves of her kimono. These kunai were attached to slender wires that went through a pulley system up her arm, onto her shoulder blades and down onto a large riel of wire fitted to the small of her back. Each kunai was laced with a different poison or drug, ensuring that, should the kunai hit, the target would be dropped sooner or later.

How Ami's real older brother, Touya, had gotten Nara pregnant was something none dared to speculate aloud within sight or sound of either.

The Captain of the Midlight Unit was someone Tenten loathed with a deep passion. Jubei didn't particularly like her and avoided her whenever possible. Nara seldom came into contact with her and so had no personal opinion about her. Koji and Toushiro were confused about her. To Naruto, (and he'd never admit this aloud) she was probably the person who knew him the best.

Her name was Undoh Michiko. In temperament and personality, she was almost a female replica of Naruto, if you ignored the straight-faced sardonic mockery, catty comments and general pessimistic outlook on life.

The Midlight Ranger Unit was for long-term scouting and rescue missions. They were also the only squad with a dress code. They could wear whatever they wanted underneath, but the tan bone armour and desert cloak were mandatory.

Michiko was built much the same way Tenten was, but she left her thigh-length wavy copper hair in a loose braid. She had very dark brown eyes and an attractively kind, mother-like face, belied by the constant stream of mocking commentary in any given situation. She did, however, act much like a mother cat towards Naruto and her squad.

She was Naruto's designated drinking buddy and they had their own table in the tavern two islands over called the Drunken Puppy.

As far as outsiders could tell, the youngest of the Captains was Shelke of the Mirage Scout and Sabotage Unit. The shinobi of the Mirage Unit moved solitarily during their missions, going into buildings and closed off areas for information and sabotage.

Shelke should have been twenty-one that year, but she still looked like she was twelve. She had been the only one to survive Orochimaru's experiment, Deepground, sane. They called her Shelke the Translucent for her ability to reflect light away from her, making her effectively invisible.

But she did not age. It was a side-effect of what was called a 'Mako shower'. Usually Mako was poisonous, but in moderation and greatly diluted, it would cause mutation in both the body and the charka system. For Shelke, she gained the ability to go 'invisible', but she would never grow up, and she had to stay close enough to a home-base to have a Mako shower at the same time every day, or she would die an agonising death over the course of only a few hours.

She was very fast and wielded a pair of wakizashi through which she channelled her mutated ember-red charka, lighting up the blades and her eyes with a fearsome fiery light.

Shelke, herself, was a small, slender girl at 4'7, with a pretty heart-shaped face surrounded by auburn hair cut just above her shoulders and large, sad blue-grey eyes. She was a very sad girl, an embittered woman in a child's body.

Naruto had met and assisted a woman named Shaluah in finding her younger sister several years ago. Shaluah had lost her left eye and the use of her left arm the day the two of them and a friend of Shaluah, a foreigner called Vincent Valentine, had entered Orochimaru's lab and rescued Shelke and several children who had yet to be experimented on. During the retreat, Naruto managed to save Shelke in the long-run by sealing a Mako tube and several hundred litres of refined and diluted Mako into a scroll.

Shaluah, herself, worked in the Mist Biolab and Forensics Unit in the basement of the Hospital, attempting to find a way to help her sister around the workload from the Interrogation, Medical and forensic units. She would never be a field agent again and so wasn't on the hunt with the rest of the Captains.

Vincent Valentine, who had also been experimented on by Orochimaru in another attempt at immortality, was Captain of the Sandstorm Rescue Unit. He had had a being called 'Chaos' seal within him, and it had extended his life much as Mako had Shelke's.

His primary weapon was an odd projectile weapon that used small metal projectiles launched by the explosive black powder used in fireworks. His left hand was mutated and so was concealed by a clawed gauntlet to his shoulder. He kept using odd abilities even he didn't know about, but could use instinctively if the situation called for it. He was a very secretive person and seldom said anything for the sake of speaking.

If Naruto ever needed a place to either hide or just think in peace, it was habit to hide in Vincent's room. Naruto and Vincent got along very well, considering the differences in personality. No one but Vincent, Shelke, Shaluah and Naruto had ever been in the Chaos-bearer's room.

At the moment, Rath and his hounds were at point, focused on following the scent of the Oto-nin, while Shelke and Rider scouted ahead, melding into the shadows. Vincent and Michiko took right flank while Hunny-chan and Mori-san took left flank. Tenten, Toushiro, Shard and Naruto moved in a diamond formation around Ami and Nara ran as rearguard. It was a formation they had been using for years now whenever they hunted together.

As usual, even the usually placid Ami hummed with excitement and a little bloodlust. The pack was looking for a fight

**(SPACE)**.

It was nearing noon when Rider and Shelke came back to report a group of Oto-nin up ahead.

"That medic-nin, Kabuto, is there." Shelke murmured. "They must have been desperate for that information for him to be here."

Naruto nodded absently in agreement.

"And they _are_ trespassing," Shard agreed, "It is within our rights to retaliate for their invasion of our territory."

There were murmurs of agreement from the rest of the Captains.

The Kyuubi Vessel absently flicked a loose lock of sunny hair over his shoulder, already planning their attack. "Shelke; Take Nara as close as you can get and give us their numbers and a general idea of their power. Rider; Take Rath and his puppies-" The 'puppies' growled. "- and go around the perimeter. I don't want the cavalry to arrive at a crucial moment. The rest of you know the drill; when we know their power, Rider and Vincent guard Ami and pick off outliers from the trees, Shiro and I come in from the West, Tenten and Nara from the East, Michiko and Shelke from the South and Shard and Rath from the North. I don't want any runaways. We're too close to the border and we'll have to let them go if they make it across. Unconscious or crippled to the point of uselessness is fine, just-"

"-Don't leave them capable of stabbing you in the back." The Captains chorused in unison, all smiling or grinning. Naruto's eyebrow rose at them, rousing a few snickers.

"Shoo."

Masks were put on and the four (or six if you include hounds) burst into movement while the others readied themselves for a massacre.

**(SPACE)**

There were twelve Chuunin, eight Jounin and Kabuto. Three of the Chuunin and one Jounin were kunoichi specialising in Genjutsu, two Jounin and four Chuunin were Taijutsu specialists and the rest were Ninjutsu or general practice shinobi. Kabuto appeared to be the only medic in the group.

The group were about to move in for the kill when another six Jounin came in with two Konoha Jounin and three genin.

Naruto heard Tenten swear when she recognised Inuzuka Kiba and Hyuuga Neji. He shared her sentiments. Things just got more complicated.

"Rath, go back the way they came. One of the Jounin is an Inuzuka, so his animal partner is still out there."

"How do you know it's not dead already?" Shiro enquired.

Tenten answered. "He looks worried, not grieving. Inuzuka are bound to their hound partner at birth. The bond will last for as long as they both live as the hound takes on the lifespan of the human partner. Losing the hound is like losing a limb for an Inuzuka."

Rath and his hounds disappeared immediately. Rath would have been inconsolable if Crewger or Illusar, his hounds, suffered a mishap, so he understood what the Inuzuka would go through.

**(SPACE)**

After that, the entire battle plan was changed. Rider was shifted to back up Shard and Vincent was stationed to get the genin out as soon as the fighting started. Shelke was to move in and cut the bonds holding Hyuuga and Inuzuka. Michiko would be teamed with Nara while Shiro would tag-team Ami. Tenten was to attack first as the heavy-hitter with Hunny and Mori covering her arse. Rath and his hounds had yet to return, so they had been left out of the attack plan. Naruto, himself, would give the signals and specifically target anyone important, like Kabuto.

Settled on a branch behind a tree, Naruto lifted his plain mask and put a bird-whistle to his lip, blowing out a few notes readily identifiable as a whip bird.

This was the signal for Shelke to cut the bonds.

Since he knew what to look for and his eyes were unnaturally sharp, he could see the slight warping of the background where the light warped around the woman-child's shape. A brief flash of surprise flickered over the two jounin's faces as Shelke cut the bonds.

Then Naruto gave the second signal that would be the one that told Vincent to get the genin out and everyone to attack. It was the shrill cry of a shruiko, a bird living only in densly misted areas whose cry portended death and bloodshed.

A brilliant crimson cloak plummeted out of the sky and covered the genin as Tenten, Hunny and Mori surged from their hiding place to the left.

Naruto grinned, already moving himself.

* * *

The Captains and where they're from.

Rider-Abducted from **Fate/Stay Night.**

Vincent- Abducted from** Final Fantasy VII.**

Nara- Mine

Ami- Abducted from** Sailor Moon**

Naruto- Take a wild guess. -_deadpan look_-

Tenten- ditto

Michiko- Mine

Rath- Modelled of Rath from the **Dragon Knights **manga.

Toushiro- Abducted from **Bleach.**

Shelke- Abducted from **Final Fantasy VII: Dirge of Cerberus**

Shaluah- Ditto

Hunny- Lured away with candy from **Ouran High Host Club. **(Currently being held in a secure location to avoid the Ootari Private Police Force.

Mori- Ditto.

Shard- Mine.

Pleez Review


	8. Chapter 8

**Disclaimer: Me no own, you no sue. Cheers.**

I know I said it'd be up a few weeks ago, but I had trouble with how to end it. Sorry.

Naruto hasn't had much interaction with Jiriya since his banishment, but he will get in contact with him soon.

* * *

If there was one activity Naruto loved as much or more than sex, it was fighting.

The blonde Jinchuuriki flashed through a series of hand Seals that gave him long blue chakra claws from his fingertips in a mockery of a medical jutsu.

The two Jounin startled by Tenten's charge didn't see Naruto coming at them until he was passed them. They collapsed like marionettes with their strings cut, the nerves in their backs severed.

Silence hacked his way through three more Jounin and a Chuunin before pausing and leaning back as a Jounin flew past him with Nara in hot pursuit. Moving again as soon as she was past, the S-Class nin made a beeline for Kabuto, who was being pressed hard between a massively pissed off and vengeful Shelke and a grieving and vengeful Inuzuka.

Silence paused long enough to savour the look on the Medic-nin's face, also vaguely wondering how the bastard had survived as long as he had. Absently paralysing a Chuunin that lunged at him, Silence glided forward, noting that, aside from the Chuunin he'd just brought down, Kabuto was the only enemy ninja still fighting.

Catching Shelke's eye, he positioned himself behind the medic-nin and jerked his head. The woman-child nodded and surged forward, wakizashi blazing and deliberately distorting the light around her in a distracting manner.

As predicted, the white-haired ninja jumped backwards in an attempt to put distance between them, unknowingly putting himself unhealthily close to Silence.

Resisting the urge to roll his eyes, Silence reverted to a simple, practical means of incapacitation rather than the flashy, excessive-use-of-chakra means most ninja used, and used a basic sleeper hold.

Kabuto dropped like a marionette.

The Taichou of the Maelstrom Squad turned around to survey the damage his squad had done, paused and…

…TWITCH…

Turning back around, Naruto took a several deep breaths and counted backwards from ten. He got to seven, an amazing feat given the circumstances.

He spun on his heel and addressed his team.

"Children," The captains winced at the mild tone. "Why is it that only my opponents are still alive when I said to take prisoners?"

"Gomen nasei, Taichou." They chorused, appearing professionally embarrassed.

Naruto glared at them sternly. "Seal the bodies and anything else you can find. Bind the prisoners and Sleet can heal them enough to stop them from dying. Sandstorm!" AKA, Vincent.

The crimson cloaked man drifted out of the trees, the three rookie genin behind him and bunched together, obviously scared of the man. They scurried to stand behind Hyuuga Neji as though he could protect them.

Glancing around, the blond man barked another order. "Midlight! Go see what's taking Night Air so long." Michiko nodded and took off in the direction Rath had taken.

Making sure everyone was doing what they were told in a suitably cowed fashion, Naruto turned back to stare at the shinobi from Konohagakure.

"Now." He spoke calmly, in a very reasonable voice. "What are two Jounin and three…" He paused to regard the trio of terrified children hiding behind Neji, before continuing somewhat hesitantly, "…genin doing inside the boundaries of another Hidden Village's country? As far as I know we are not expecting anymore people from Konohagakure anytime soon."

Neji stepped forward, his long dark hair swaying loosely to his hips, a slight red swelling at the corner of his mouth making his lips look pouty. "I was sent with an urgent missive for our ambassadors in Hidden Storm and had just crossed the borders when I was set upon by these Oto-nin." He kicked a corpse at his feet as if to make a point. "I don't know why they're here." He tossed his long silky locks in Kiba's direction.

The Inuzuka, however, was at a stand-off with Toushiro and snarling, trying to get at the unconscious Kabuto. Which drew his attention to another matter.

"Mirage, if you want a piece of Kabuto, you should be sucking up to Razor Wind since her unit will be doing the interrogating."

Shelke shimmered into view a few steps away from the unconscious medic-nin and glared at Naruto, knowing her plans were foiled, before stalking off towards Nara.

Since Kiba didn't appear to be about to settle down anytime soon, Naruto turned his attention to the genin.

Looking them over with a critical eye, he decided that the girl, who was probably a Yamanaka from her eyes and long blond hair, exempting the darkly tanned skin, was most likely the most level-headed at this point in time.

"You, the blond." The girl almost glared at him. "What's your name?"

The girl shifted warily, her long blond pigtail swaying slightly at the movement. "Triela."

Naruto nodded approvingly. "Well, Triela, how did a genin team manage to be captured by Oto-nin within our borders?"

Triela settled instinctively into an at-attention stance and spoke in the standard 'reporting to a superior' tone.

"We were on a C-Rank mission to retrieve a bag of gems stolen from a jeweller by a trio of non-shinobi bandits. We tracked them to a cave to the south-west of Wave Country where the borders meet with Wind County. We completed the mission and were returning when we were set upon by the Oto-nin. We were rendered helpless and brought here."

Naruto nodded and sighed. "Alright, I believe you. But, unfortunately, war-time orders dictate that any non-Storm Shinobi found within Wave borders without permission must be brought back to Suto-mu and properly questioned, the report filed, paperwork filled out and a scathing letter sent back to their Hidden Village before they get tossed back over the border." Naruto sighed again and rubbed the back of his neck. "This is gonna be a pain in the ass." He waved the genin and Neji into the shade of a tree, Rider and Vincent not-so-subtly keeping an eye on them.

Turning back to Kiba and Shiro, the blonde was saved from having to intervene by the arrival of Michiko, Rath, Crewger and Illusar, and a large blood-stained grey dog being carried by the Hound-Master.

"Akamaru!"

And, just like that, a potential fight was averted.

Naruto moved off the begin the pack-up, pausing only long enough to causally kick the waking Kabuto in the temple to send him back to Lala Land.

**(space)**

The next day, Naruto was lounging in the hammock in his private garden, making a half-assed effort to finish the paperwork from the day before, when he heard a soft rapping at the door to his room.

Regarding the door into his room for a moment, the blonde decided that he couldn't be bothered to get up and settled back into his hammock and cushions.

"It's open," he called when they rapped again.

He heard the door slide open and three people enter.

He continued writing the paragraph on the actions of Shelke towards Kabuto until the three entered the garden and stopped.

Naruto looked up when there was a sharp intake of breath from one of the three and sighed in annoyance when he saw who it was.

Nara Shikamaru was at point and didn't look that surprised, but Hyuuga Neji and Uchiha Sasuke were speechless and their jaws had dropped.

Hiding his consternation, Naruto shifted the papers enough to hide his nakedness and raised his eyebrow in question. "Yes?"

"Troublesome." Shikamaru smirked. "I should have known it was you."

The other eyebrow rose in question. "Me?"

"Yes, you."

"And what is it that I have done?"

"You have inspired total devotion in the people of Wave Country. And Hidden Storm is hesitant to help us because of how our village treated you." The Deer summoner's lips twisted ironically. "We came to see the Commander of the Maelstrom Squad, who I assume is you?" Naruto nodded, absently noting movement out of the corner of his eye. "We came because you were reputed to be the most reasonable and neutral member of the Shinobi Council. If we had known it was you, we probably wouldn't have bothered."

Naruto's lip twitched in amusement. "Yes you would have. If only out of misplaced childhood expectations or to assess what kind of threat I am."

Shikamaru paused and thought a moment. "True." He thought again for a moment. "I wasn't certain, but was that you and Tenten in the training area two days ago?"

Behind Shikamaru, Neji went rigid.

The blonde shrugged in a way that could have meant either yes or no, turning his attention back to the report. "Probably. She's the Captain of the Hurricane Full-Assault Unit now." He added absently.

"Really?" Shikamaru sounded only vaguely interested in that.

"Really." There was another flicker from the doorway of his room and a third on the roof.

Shinobi were so nosy.

"Why did Tenten go Nukenin?"

Naruto glanced at Neji in surprise. "It's complicated. I'll have the files regarding that taken to your room later. For now, suffice to say, she would have been killed by a government official to keep her silent if she had stayed."

"And why did you leave?" came a dark voice in the direction of the person whose very existence he was ignoring.

"Don't talk to me, snake-bait." Naruto bit out harshly, not at all troubled by the sharp intake of breath from all three of them. "Now can you all please leave? I want to get my report done before genin training this afternoon and I'd prefer that my backyard didn't become an amphitheatre."

The three started and looked around, finally noticing the dozen or so ninja perched on the walls, roof and porch behind them.

Naruto smiled a fake smile. "Nara, would you and some volunteers please escort our guests back to their quarters?"

Shikamaru blinked before Nara responded from on the wall to the left, her mask, depicting red claw marks running diagonally over the face and the eye sockets covered in mirror glass, firmly in place. "As you wish, Naruto-sama, so shall it be done."

Gesturing to three other Maelstrom unit members, one from Silent Breeze and two from Zephyr, the three Konoha-nin were ushered and shoved out of Naruto's rooms.

"And the rest of you," The remaining ninja regarded their local hero with curiosity. "Can bloody well bugger off."

The spectators laughed, but, nevertheless, left Naruto to his solitude and report-writing.

**(space)**

"I heard you had a little get-together with some old…comrades earlier."

Naruto _hated _it when Koji just wandered into his room without permission, especially when he was naked.

Like now.

"My, my, my, my. How news travels." The blonde commented mildly, moving into his closet and quite firmly closing the door as a hint for the dark boy to stay out.

And, as usual, Koji blatantly ignored the unspoken order, opening the sliding door, entering and closing it again, only to not-quite-pout when he found that Naruto had slipped on a pair of loose green pants as soon as the man had shut himself in.

"You're no fun." Koji grouched.

"And you're a minor." Naruto snapped back, finally having had enough of the boy and more than willing to give him an earful. "I do not have sex with _anyone_ under the age of twenty for _any_ reason, and I am most certainly not going to make an exception for you _or_ Shiro. Do you understand, Uchiha?"

Koji had since recoiled from Silence and was looking somewhat shocked. Naruto had never truly gotten angry at him, so the blonde must really have been tense.

Regaining control of himself and brushing the snappish reaction off, Koji bowed respectfull. "My apologies. If you had said something earlier I would have stopped doing so. I will go wait with the rest of the team in the Dojo."

Naruto felt a twig of regret,but brushed it off, turning his back to the retrearting Uchiha.

Just as he was slipping in his sandles, he felt a flicker of dark, cool chakra, the signature of an Uchiha. Wondering what Koji wanted now, Naruto sighed but didn't turn around.

"What do you want now, Koji? I thought you were going to wait in the Dojo."

Koji didn't answer and came closer.

Annoyed, Naruto stood and turned around, ready to tell his student off again...

...Sasuke moved forward quickly, shoving the srtarled blonde up against the wall and pinning his wrists above his head.

Naruto swore silently as he found himself staring into the pale face and large dark eyes of the boy he had once loved.

But Sasuke wasn't a boy anymore.

* * *

HA! Cliffhanger!

Pleez Review


	9. Chapter 9

**_Disclaimer: I own nothing recognised as belonging to someone else._**

I've had a fair bit of this chapterr and parts of next chapter for a while, but they were in peices and I've been a bit busy so I haven't had much of a chance to peice them together.

Hope you enjoy it, and the thrid installment of the Sasu/Naru installment will be coming next chapter.

* * *

Growling, Naruto used the wall as leverage to curl his right leg up and push it into the raven's chest while fluctuating his chakra in three sharp pulses, pausing and repeating several times in the standard request for assistance.

Wriggling his body so the Uchiha Avenger had to work to hold him, Silence rose to the forefront, turned his head and bit hard into Sasuke's inner elbow, worrying at it like a dog with a bone.

The shinobi was dumped on his arse when Sasuke jumped back, a hand latched over the bleeding wound on his arm and swearing wrathfully.

Silence smirked up at him from his place on the floor, blood running down his chin and coating his teeth and a strange look the blonde felt he should recognise passed over his once-friend's pale face.

They remained unmoving for several nearly-eternal moments, just staring; Sasuke with that same look mixed with a desire to know something, Silence with territorial aggression that the bastard would invade his personal place and flat out pissed-off-ness that the traitor would dare seek him out after what he did.

It was Silence who shattered his namesake.

"What do you want from me, Uchiha?" The blonde man hissed. "I would have thought it obvious I want nothing to do with a traitor like you."

The other man's face darkened.

"Like you can talk, Dobe!" He hissed." You're not much better. At least I went back and accepted my punishment. What happened to your dream of being Hokage? Did you abandon it like you abandoned Konoha?"

Sasuke paused his verbal assault when he noticed the surprised flit over Naruto's face. He wasn't able to find out what it was about, however, because he collapsed to the ground, unconscious, moments later.

Shaluah strode into the mostly undamaged wardrobe, gun in her only operational hand and eye dashing around the room as it took in the situation, just as Shelke flickered into the visible spectrum above Sasuke's prone body, eyes still glowing ember-red and obviously a little jumpy.

Naruto crossed his legs and wiped the blood off his chin, face troubled.

The sisters turned their attention to their commander and waited for him to speak. They felt that there was a vaguely personal feel from this attack. Sensing this early on, the two had waved back the twelve ninja who had appeared in short order after they had felt their commander's call for assistance. But when the Konoha-nin had said hurtful things to Naruto-sama, Shelke had ignored her older sister and attacked the black-haired bastard.

Sighing, Naruto got up and granted a small smile to the sisters and the ninjas standing in the doorway.

"Thank-you for coming to my assistance. I do not believe I could have brought him down on my own without significant damage to my wardrobe."

The eight ninja relaxed slightly, obviously having been worried that there was more to the summons than was readily apparent.

Naruto stood, gingerly rolling the stiffness out of his shoulders and vertebrae. "Someone take him down to the holding cells and keep two guards on him at all times."

Two shinobi Naruto identified as Dark and the little red Daisuke came forward and lifted the raven-haired man and began to move off with him.

Pondering a moment, he stopped the two long enough to advise them "And you may want to have him sedated enough that he can't think straight when he wakes up. I'll be down sometime tonight or tomorrow morning."

Dark nodded before sidling out of the room with Daisuke and the unconscious Sasuke, surreptitiously rubbing up against a male member of the Hurricane Unit with long blonde hair.

The blonde's ears turned bright red.

The ninja all wandered off, leaving Naruto with the two sisters.

An awkward silence descended before the blonde tilted his head towards Shaluah.

"How's the arm?"

The auburn-haired woman moved her right hand as if to touch her left before letting it fall. "It's been tingling painfully the last few days."

"Ah." Naruto nodded. "Maybe you should get Ami or Inari to look at it."

"Maybe." She answered, noncommittally.

All three ninja in the room were well aware that Shaluah had lost all feeling in her left arm and part of the shoulder, but like many people who had a limb amputated, willingly or no, there were phantom pains and discomfort dreamt up by the brain refusing to let go.

Shaluah turned to her younger sister. "We should be going. It is almost time for your Mako Shower."

Shelke sighed before leaving the room without a word.

Shaluah gave the commander a lip twitch that passed as her smile before leaving.

Naruto sighed and went back to getting ready for instructing Team One; aka the Genin-Team-From-Hell.

**(SPACE)**

"Yes. I can feel it. It's coming!" The dark girl, Hanajima Saki, whispered fervently, eyes closed.

Her violet eyes sprang open. "It's here!"

With a flourish of her hand, she revealed…

…A Royal Flush.

Koji and the other male teammate, Tomoe Yasuo, both swore as they revealed their hands.

Naruto chuckled, knowing full well that the only person who could beat Hana-chan at Poker was himself, and only then because of his ridiculously abundant luck.

The three genin were huddled in the corner of the Dojo in their genin uniforms. The uniforms, barely distinguishable from the Chuunin and Jounin uniforms, were a full-body black bodysuit made from silk (1), bleached bone armour styled after Konahagakure's ANBU armour, black sharkskin boots (sandals had been disregarded since they left the toes bare) and a blank white mask.

At a glance, the only way to distinguish his team from the multitudes of other Storm genin in the Dojo was the hair; Koji had his black ponytail and forelocks, Hana-chan had her long dark-green braid and Yasuo's fluffy silver halo around his head.

…And they were the only ones not currently being worked like dogs.

Naruto let out a small, barely noticeable affectionate smirk. His Team One was well-built, well-trained and well-matched. Though he'd only been working with them for a little over a month, the blonde had already put them forward for the Chuunin exams beginning next month in Konoha.

It was something Naruto was both anticipating and dreading.

* * *

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	10. Chapter 10

**Disclaimer: I own nada recognised as belonging to someone else.**

Next chapter is the beginning or the Chuunin Exams and the return of Kohaku and this team of ickle Genin.

A head of golden hair lay nestled against the bare left breast of Lady Jubei, listening to the consistent beat of her heart. Flung across her waist was an arm belonging to the dark-haired Inari, who was sleeping in the crook of her right shoulder.

The three naked figures, hair unbound and sheets tangled around their forms, lay in a patch of bright moonlight; two sleeping, one wide awake.

Naruto just couldn't sleep, no matter how tired he was he was just too restless to sleep.

He gently disentangled himself from his lovers and pulled on the pale grey sleeping yukata. He glanced back at the two figures on the futon before quietly slipping out of the room.

**(space)**

An hour later, Naruto was still wandering the Main Compound, prowling along the tops of the whitewashed garden walls around the personal living spaces for guests like a grey ghost in the moonlight, occasionally flicking a handsign to the sentries in the shadows.

After some time meditating whilst moving, he finally caught the thought that had been teasing him for a while.

Uchiha Sasuke hadn't known Naruto had been exiled. The only reason Naruto could come up with that the council would lie to their beloved Uchiha was if said prick had come back because of Naruto. Or at least expecting Naruto to accept and forgive him.

Either way, Naruto hadn't had much interest in Konohagakure, so he'd kept his nose out of their affairs.

There was only one person he could thing of who was logical and unemotional enough to give him the answers he wanted.

So here Naruto was, leaping quietly down into one of the gardens and approaching the veranda door.

He rapped sharply then took a large step back.

Nara Shikamaru opened the screen door, his hair uncharacteristically loose, shirtless and with a kunai held loosely in his hand.

"Yo." Naruto greeted his ex-comrade.

**(space)**

The two regarded one another across the low table and their cups of green tea.

Naruto quietly sipped his tea, totally relaxed now that Shikamaru had commented his presence with 'Mendoukusa_i._'and a shake of his head, obviously knowing better than to try to attack the blonde on his own turf.

"So," the lazy young man started, "What brings you to my room so early in the morning?"

Naruto sighed, not out of any emotional reaction, but simply because he hadn't been breathing deeply enough. "I wanted to know what, exactly, they've been telling people about my departure from Konohagakure all those years ago."

The blonde shinobi could just see the little hamster in the Nara's head running as fast on its wheel as its little legs could carry it.

After a long moment of silence, Shikamaru began.

"It was leaked out that you had become unstable after your failure to bring Uchiha back to Konoha after your battle at the Valley of the End. After your recovery, you, according to reports from several ANBU, broke into the Hokage Tower, stole several jutsu scrolls, burnt out your apartment and ran, killing several Chuunin and a team of fresh genin on the way out. Hunter-nin were sent to bring you back alive, but failed to return. Their bodies were found a few days later, torn apart."

Naruto had sat back and was frowning deeper and deeper as the story went on.

The Deer Summoner regarded the quiet and powerful man his once loud and annoying classmate had become. The Nara had always suspected that there was more to it than just becoming unhinged and running off to retrieve the Uchiha without permission. Especially since the 'unhinged' missing-nin proved to be just as insane as most other career shinobi he knew, he was thus more than willing to listen to Naruto's version.

And if it was different to the version from the Elder Council's, he was definitely breaking out the emergency Sealed Communications Scroll given to him by Tsunade-sama.

Tongue in cheek, Naruto put down his now cool cup of tea, eyes fixated on the leaf stem floating upright in his tea, wondering at the irony of it **(1)**.

"As soon as I was capable of leaving my bed, but not really be discharged from the hospital, I was taken by ANBU to the Council meeting chambers where, by majority consensus, I was banished from Konohagakure, stripped of my shinobi rank and told that if I ever set foot in Hi no Kuni again, I'd be executed. My banishment was effective immediately. I had an hour to get out of Konoha and two days to get out of Hi no Kuni. I tried to get to see Tsunade immediately, but she was in surgery and wouldn't be out for hours. I then went back to my apartment only to find it blazing already. If all their plans had went accordingly, I would have been left with nothing but the hospital pyjamas I was in. Fortunately, since I was used to my stuff being trashed, I had several emergency caches stashed away around Konoha. Three had been found and destroyed, but I managed to find two on my way out of the Village. I was run out by various ninja and a mob of civilians. I have no idea what happened to the ninja I supposably killed on my way out, nor the Hunter-nin, but I would suspect Danzou's Root unit since he's the reason Tenten had to run for it. I made my way here to Nami no Kuni where I knew I'd be accepted for my involvement in the Bridge Building Incident, but I was intercepted by Iwa Hunter-nin and attacked for my resemblance to the Yondaime Hokage. I was picked up by Jubei and some of her Clan who had been hunting the Hunter-nin and I set out to help create this Village. The rest is History and frankly none of you business."

By the end of Naruto's monologue, Shikamaru was pale but was obviously recording, analysing and storing the information as it came.

Shikamaru's dark eyes met Naruto's, serious and spooked. "Tsunade-hime must be made aware of this immediately."

Naruto tilted his jaw in acquiesce. "I'll sign the message in blood."

**(Space)**

After leaving Shikamaru to his serious thoughts as he went over Tenten's report, Naruto found his feet taking him to the Detention Facilities in the very centre of the living area, making virtually impossible to escape without someone noticing.

Still in his sleep-wear, Silence drifted through the false-dawn light, passing a few early risers and sentries coming in from the shift change.

He wandered down into the underground, three-foot iron enforced cellblock. The doors were enforced metal that went into time-lockdown if an alarm went off and no consecutive doors were open at any one time. The lighting was red fluorescent that allowed adequate vision but enabled the prisoners to sleep.

Uchiha Sasuke was in an open-barred cell on the first level. The two guards left at Naruto's nonverbal order.

He was, surprisingly, still asleep, so Naruto settled down cross-legged against the wall opposite the bars and studied the man.

Naruto vaguely remembered loving to watch Sasuke sleep when they went on missions. He had just been so pretty and innocently doll-like when they were younger, but now there was a tiredness there that was present even when he slept. Faint lines marked his face, similar to Itachi's. The face had matured from an unspeakably pretty child to a darkly beautiful man. His skin was still pale as alabaster, but his silky raven hair had grown, framing his face with silky fly-away locks and flowing over his shoulders to mid-shoulder blade length. His fingernails were longer too, red as his Sharingan with a spot of black in the middle of each nail.

And yet for all the comparisons, Naruto found the raven less in every way when compared to Itachi, and even Koji. The blonde vaguely wondered, philosophically, if it was because he knew that Itachi had saved Sasuke out of love when he was ordered to murder his clan, showing a depth of emotion that Naruto honestly doubted Sasuke was capable of; Koji, however, was simply stunning in his dainty beauty, and his frankly obsessive infatuation with Naruto, coupled with his patience to learn, made him much more trustworthy in the blonde's blue eyes.

Naruto knew, had known for some time, that he had once loved Uchiha Sasuke, had since fallen in love with Uchiha Itachi to an extent, and would probably fall in love with Uchiha Koji.

There was something about Uchiha's that drew him to them.

Naruto was brought out of his increasingly depressing thoughts when the raven shifted his eyes fluttering open and, after a moment, recognising the blonde form seated against the wall.

Those dark eyes widened with surprise before softening with what Naruto now recognised as love and lust.

"Naruto…" Sasuke breathed, eyes drinking his beautiful dobe in.

Naruto stared back indifferently, now knowing for certain that he truly didn't care for this man anymore; neither as friend or even as a person.

His voice was detached and rang clearly into the Uchiha's ears, shattering his heart like he had shattered Naruto's long, long ago.

"Steel and Stones are hard on Bones/ aimed with Angry Art./ Words can sting like anything/ but Silence breaks the Heart." Naruto quoted the child's ditty and stood. "Let go of the past and look to the future."

He gave one last look at the frozen man and walked off, his words drifting back.

"Yours is a future I have no interest in being a part of."

Sasuke came out of his stupor and threw himself at the Seal-enforced bars, screaming at the retreating back, "Naruto? NARUTO?!"

Silence kept walking until he returned to the futon with his lovers, his heart closed to the distraught man screaming his name over and over in the holding cell until the guards sedated him.

* * *

**1. **A tea stem floating upright in tea is considered a good omen.

Cheers! ;D


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